


and you were in it

by thenbringmeback (neganstonguething)



Category: The Exorcist (TV)
Genre: Angst, Blowjobs, M/M, Unhappy Ending, Vague Sex, not character death but still sad, some minor gross stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-09
Updated: 2018-03-09
Packaged: 2019-03-29 01:14:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13916214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neganstonguething/pseuds/thenbringmeback
Summary: He knows it's not Marcus. Even if the Marcus in his dreams had those same blue eyes, it wouldn't be him. Marcus is gone. Tomas has no idea if he'll ever come back. But he needs this. Needs Marcus. So he'll take what he can get. And what he can get happens to be a figment of his imagination.





	and you were in it

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my first Tomarcus/The Exorcist work that isn't a drabble! I've got a couple of chaptered works planned out and am working on them slowly but surely, but this has been dancing around in my head for a couple of weeks. After hacking away at it little by little, I think I'm finally satisfied with it.
> 
> This started out as a request from a friend. For spoilers' sake, I won't say what the request is until the endnotes, but I had a lot of fun with it. It probably wasn't what they wanted, but I hope they enjoy it regardless! 
> 
> Hope y'all like it!

In Marcus' absence, Tomas' dreams grow more vivid, and more centered around his long-lost partner. But it's not Marcus he dreams of. It's the twisted image of him that Angela's demon had composed to shake him up on the day he became an exorcist. It's the Marcus whose blue eyes have been replaced with that angry, frightening shade of brownish red. The Marcus who taunts him. The Marcus who reminds him how shameful and putrid he actually is. The Marcus he deserves.  
  
He hates how much he loves it. When he dreams, Marcus is always so close. Always behind him or in front of him or _inside_ him, and it makes him crazy every damn time. He calls Tomas 'filthy' and 'unworthy' and insults his very existence as a human being and a priest and an exorcist. But when the dream ends and Tomas finds himself lying in a hotel room or the seat of a truck, he always wishes for just a few more moments to himself and his impure nightmares.  
  
This time, he awakens into an exorcism. Mouse is there, and so is Marcus. Just the way Tomas wants it. He doesn't recognize the woman tied to the bed screeching inhumanly, but his mind tells him he knows her. Marcus is in the middle of drawing a cross on her forehead, and Mouse is praying behind him. Tomas is clumsily just standing there, looking around. They're in a home, in someone's bedroom—the woman's, presumably. As per usual, the windows are covered. The room is dirty and reeks of rot and vomit and body odor. The woman on the bed—Adrienne, Tomas' brain tells him—is filthy and oozing green and brown and blood from all over her body. She's sneering at Marcus through unbrushed teeth, her graying tongue stuck out. They've been at this for a while, it seems.  
  
It's pure chaos, and even after several moments, when it's suddenly not, Tomas just stands there, because that's what his dream tells him to do. Marcus steps back, panting, and Mouse stops reciting. The room seems to pause around them. Adrienne stills and falls into a restless sleep. Mouse moves toward one of the windows and pulls back the blanket covering it to peer out. Marcus directs his attention to Tomas.  
  
And then he strides toward him. Two seconds that feel like eternity pass, while Tomas watches Marcus. He misses him dearly, so he shamelessly drinks in the sight. The crinkling of his eyes as he scowls, and the way his jacket swishes around his torso while he walks. The gentle shifting of his pants around his thighs with each step. Tomas allows himself the filthy thought that he wants to drop to his knees and pay worship to those thighs.  
  
He's so distracted by his moments of observation that he's legitimately surprised when Marcus closes his fingers tightly around his upper arm and all-but drags him out of the room. The sensation is familiar and immediately brings the memory of Tomas' slip-up with Casey Rance's demon to mind. It's probably supposed to.  
  
Soon, he's in the upstairs restroom. It's just him and Marcus, who has just locked the door.  
  
"Marcus—"  
  
"Something on your mind, Tomas?" Marcus questions. Tomas' subconscious has slapped on that irritated edge to Marcus' voice, and the air of scrutiny around them makes Tomas uncomfortable. He feels lectured, ducks his head shamefully, and bares his teeth in mild irritation.  
  
Of course, this darker Marcus seems to prey on it, and immediately resorts to taunting. "You sure you can do this? We don't have room for backsliding in there. That woman could die because of you."  
  
Tomas doesn't have an explanation for his hesitation. His dream just painted the picture that way. So he glares up at Marcus and into the eyes that are supposed to be blue.  
  
"You want me to send you away again?" Marcus taunts.  
  
"That's not fair," Tomas retorts.  
  
"What's not fair," Marcus sneers back, "is you standing there with your bloody fingers up your ass while Mouse and I work ourselves to the bone. I'm _tired_ , Tomas. She's tired. I know you're tired like we are, but you've got to stay focused."  
  
"I _am_ focused," Tomas' subconscious makes him say. It feels like a lie.  
  
"You're _not_." Marcus' tone is dry and scrapes against Tomas' already taut nerves like sandpaper.  
  
"What do you want me to do about it?" Tomas snaps, walking toward the sink. He can't very well look at Marcus and tell him he's dreaming and that he doesn't know anything about the person they're performing an exorcism on right now. He doesn't want to wake up. Marcus is here.  
  
So he turns on the tap, intent on washing his face and bringing his focus back.  
  
The water doesn't run.  
  
Tomas watches it expectantly, but nothing. He finds himself resting his hands around the sink as if he might double over and throw up.  
  
This is the pattern. Tomas dreams (and knows it), and he perpetually feels sick. He encounters Marcus in some way or another. Stares into those reddish, metallic-looking eyes as if they might suddenly fade to the endless blues he fell in love with back when he could see them on a daily basis. He indulges the demon. Feels sick the entire time. But he craves it. Every last drop of it.  
  
He knows it's not Marcus. Even if the Marcus in his dreams had those same blue eyes, it wouldn't be him. Marcus is gone. Tomas has no idea if he'll ever come back. But he needs this. Needs Marcus. So he'll take what he can get. And what he can get happens to be a figment of his imagination.  
  
Marcus' hand closes over Tomas' on the sink, and as if led by the course of his dream, Tomas turns his gaze up to regard him. His eyes follow the expanse of Marcus' bare forearm, past the bunched-up shirt sleeve beyond his elbow, along his shoulder, and to those shallow, coppery eyes he can't see through. He swallows down nervousness.  
  
He hates this just as much as he loves it.  
  
"You can talk to me, Tomas." Marcus' voice is deep and warm like honey tea in the morning. Tomas instantly finds comfort in it. "I'm here for you."  
  
"...This is a dream," Tomas tells himself as a reminder more than anything. "You're not real."  
  
"It is, is it?" Marcus almost sounds wounded by the words.  
  
"...Yes." Oh, how Tomas longs to not be a slave to his dreams like this. "Nothing more."  
  
"What makes you say that?" Marcus questions. Tomas shivers when the false Marcus’ hand turns and shifts upward, trailing along his arm. He feels that lean body slinking up behind him, and quivers when soft lips find the back of his neck and the scrape of a beard brushes his nape.  
  
"Because Marcus is gone."  
  
The way Tomas talks about Marcus, it feels like he's talking about a dead man. He feels guilty for his own bitterness, but he hadn't wanted to say goodbye. Someone might say that Tomas had been a good friend in letting Marcus do as he seemed to feel he needed, but Tomas isn't so sure. He knows he can't be the only one in pain right now.  
  
As Marcus buries his face in the back of Tomas' neck, he hisses like he's being burned. "That's a painful thing to say. You can't tell me you don't feel me right now..."  
  
That's the problem. Tomas _can_ feel him. Dream or no dream, Marcus feels incredibly real. He's warm, and Tomas can feel the scrape of that familiar jacket's zipper on his back. He can smell the leather, and the scent mingles with sweat and heat and so many things Tomas remembers fondly about Marcus. He's so hyper-aware of everything that, had this been the first time, he would honestly believe every bit of it.  
  
"It's a vivid dream," Tomas manages back pathetically. He can feel his skin prickling and his body growing shamefully warm. "It always is."  
  
"Like the dream that brought me into your life?" The imaginary Marcus taunts. "Don't tell me you'd reject me now, after all that…"  
  
Tomas wouldn't. He wants to, but he's weak. He's strong in reality because Marcus trusts him to be, but in his own head, he's as frail and useless as ever.  
  
Perhaps that's why Marcus haunts Tomas in his dreams. Because even now, he does exactly what Marcus spent months asking him not to. He can't get the exorcism right without giving his mind to demons, so he does just that. How disappointed Marcus would be.  
  
"Marcus...stop," Tomas tries, but to no avail. Those all-too-present lips press once more against the skin on the back of his neck, and he feels himself go slack into the feeling. Marcus slides his arm around Tomas' waist and draws his free hand to his chin, tipping it up.  
  
"Look at yourself," Marcus all-but coos. "You're living for this right now. Just enjoy it, Tomas. Does it matter whether it's real or fake?"  
  
Tomas sees himself. Watches his own mouth fall open when Marcus draws his hand down and flattens his palm, pulling Tomas closer to him by the waist. He chokes out a weakened response.  
  
"Yes, it does. You're not Marcus. You'd tell me I'm being manipulated if you were him."  
  
"Would I, now?" Marcus questions. "If I were the one manipulating you, why would I confess?"  
  
Tomas lets his eyes fall shut. "Because that's how Marcus is."  
  
And then he's awake. As the bathroom fades away and Tomas opens his eyes to a dimly lit hotel room, he swears he hears Marcus laugh.

When Tomas looks about the room, he sees Mouse at the window. She’s got the blackout curtains pulled just enough to let daylight peer in and alert Tomas to the fact that it’s morning and therefore time to wake up. The smell of eggs and toast swims around him and induces in him a sense of nausea not unlike waking up after a night of hard drinking.

“Eat up,” Mouse suggests, her arms crossed. Tomas gets the feeling she’s been dressed and waiting for him for quite some time. Food doesn’t sound the least bit appealing to him, but he eats anyway.

Tomas sleeps a lot more, now that Marcus invades his dreams. During the day, he’s lethargic and grumpy, and he’s caught himself feeling less and less impressed by the world around him.

And it’s not just because of his dreams. Tomas is _exhausted_. He can’t remember the last time he got to sleep in and wake up to something other than the need to hit the road. He and Mouse have been on the run for _so long_. Tomas misses his bed in Chicago, but he knows there’s work to be done. So despite his wishes and his longing, he does what he knows he’s been called upon to do.

That evening, he and Mouse visit the home of a woman named Adrienne, and while it turns out her case has nothing to do with demonic possession and much more to do with emotional trauma, Tomas can’t help but make the connection. It’s not like his dreams have never operated as visions before, after all. He doesn’t get that spine-tingling discomfort that something isn’t what it seems with Adrienne, but her name is there, just like it was in his head, and even her bedroom looks the same.

Tomas isn’t sure what to make of it, and he doesn’t have the heart to make things uncomfortable by discussing it with Mouse, so he keeps his mouth shut.

A week later, he dreams of Marcus again. This time, he’s on his knees right in front of the man…or the demon, rather. He’s got his hands on Marcus’ thighs, staring straight ahead at an open belt and zipper. Marcus has a single hand placed lightly atop Tomas’ head, smirking down at him. Tomas looks up just in time to see the demon cock Marcus’ head.

“Why’d you stop?” He questions, as if Tomas somehow magically knows what transpired before his dream that led into this. “Don’t break my heart by getting cold feet, Tomas…”

Tomas still hasn’t figured out if it’s his mind or some sort of twisted demon’s work, but whatever it is, it knows just how to manipulate Marcus’ voice to induce upon Tomas all the effects that make him weak and useless. Tomas wants this, even though he doesn’t know what led up to it.

“Does it bring back memories?” Marcus wonders aloud, almost pouting. “Do you recall what it’s like to succumb like this? How I reacted to you the last time you did this to the Rance girl? Well, you haven’t got to worry this time, because I’m not about to stop you.”

“Of course, you’re not,” Tomas mutters, more voicing thoughts than anything. “You’re not Marcus.”

“But you’re still gonna do it, aren’t you?” Marcus’ voice points out. “It’s alright, you know. Even I’m weak sometimes.”

“You’re weak a lot more than just sometimes.” Tomas draws his focus back to the open fly of Marcus’ pants, dipping his fingers into the waistband and slowly tugging them down, underwear and all. “You and Marcus both. I’m stronger than the two of you combined.”

And he is. He knows this. Even as he frees Marcus’ cock from his jeans, he knows it. He’s stronger, because even though he caves in in every single one of these dreams—lets an illusion of Marcus Keane fuck him against walls and in beds and church pews—he still gets out there when he wakes up and does what he’s supposed to do.

For a split second, Tomas thinks that maybe he can have both. This isn’t Marcus, and it never will be, but so long as his visions and Mouse’s intel are carrying them from one site to the next and people are still being saved, what should it matter what happens in Tomas’ subconscious?

_“You let a demon into your head, Tomas.”_

Tomas feels sick to his stomach again.

_“Evil leaves a mark. It stains.”_

What would Marcus think?

_“Now every thought you have…every decision that you make, is compromised.”_

Those words seem louder now that Marcus is gone. But despite their echoing in the back of Tomas’ mind, he doesn’t stop. It only takes a handful of seconds for him to have the base of this entity’s cock in his hand and his mouth around the tip. Even fewer for him to be actively bobbing.

“That’s a good boy, Tomas,” the demon or Marcus or Tomas’ subconscious praises. “Just like that. You really know how to make me crazy.”

Would Marcus allow Tomas to do this? Funny, how he’d never really thought about that situation until the man had gone off in his own direction. Now, curiosity makes him hungry and stupid. Makes him give into something that makes absolutely no sense and only shows up in his dreams.

The Marcus in Tomas’ dreams fucks his mouth shamelessly and borderline ruthlessly, fists bundled around on the hair on either side of Tomas’ head, clear until he climaxes and releases right down Tomas’ throat. Despite knowing that none of this is real, Tomas can still taste him. He swallows him down, tears from breathlessness at the corners of his eyes, and then looks up at him.

Marcus just smirks and tips his head sideways. “Oh…the kiss, right? Is that what you want, Tomas?”

Tomas doesn’t know what he wants, but he nods slowly anyway. Doesn’t move from his position, at this version of Marcus’ feet, his shoulders slumped and his body feeling pitiful and aroused and somehow useless all at the same time.

Marcus pulls him to his feet, cupping either side of his face. Tomas looks at those eyes and silently longs for the blue to return to them. For this to feel a little less like he’s grasping at straws and a little more like he’s got the real thing. A little more like he’s not disappointing Marcus.

“You’re shaking…” That deep voice notices, and when his thumb brushes Tomas’ right cheekbone, he can’t help but lean into the sensation. It feels so real, even when Tomas knows it’s not.

Tomas hasn’t been aware of the surroundings this entire time. But as the world starts to rumble around him, he realizes they’re in the bed of the truck, and it’s careening down a gravel road. Marcus licks his lips and smiles, and Tomas knows in seeing it that he’s not going to get what he wants.

“How about you wake up, instead?”

And then, he’s awake again. In the bed of the truck, with Mouse at the wheel. The truck is racing, though the road they’re on is highway rather than gravel. Tomas pushes himself to his knees and gropes for the back window, poking his head inside.

“Where are we going?” He questions loudly over the wind whipping around him.

“Away,” Mouse answers concisely. Tomas can see the stress lines on her face. “Someone came looking for us. I took care of them, but we still need to disappear.”

Tomas breathes a heavy sigh. His apprenticeship is different now, and it’s not just because he’s with Mouse instead of Marcus. They have hit a point where they honestly don’t know who they can trust and who they can’t. And with Bennett missing, their sources are questionable at best. Mouse has ignored some sources just because they sounded sketchy.

“Any idea where ‘away’ is?” Tomas asks, bracing himself when the truck hits a pothole in the road.

“East, for now,” Mouse answers. “Just long enough find a good place to fall off the radar.”

That good place turns out to be some tiny town way off the interstate. Mouse exits when she sees a food and fuel sign, but bypasses the town they’ve entered completely. The one they stop in doesn’t even look like it’s got inhabitants anymore. The gas prices at the closed station off the main drag look like they’re outdated by at least a decade, and the lights on the motel next door are all off. There are a few houses scattered about, but they’re all dilapidated. There isn’t even a sign telling them what town they’re in.

Mouse pulls into the motel parking lot and parks the truck behind the building, next to the dumpsters.

“There’s nobody here,” Tomas observes, and Mouse shrugs.

“Exactly. They’re not gonna come looking for us in a ghost town.”

Mouse, not unlike Marcus, is always surprising Tomas with her quick thinking. She breaks into the main entrance to the hotel and raids the desk for keys. Thankfully, these old hotel rooms are locked with actual physical keys rather than cards, and Mouse comes back with two. Tomas cocks an eyebrow.

“I get my own room?”

“It’s a rare treat that we don’t have to pay for, so why not?” Mouse cracks him a playful smirk, before offering one of the keys out to him. “We’re next door to each other, so if something happens, we’ll know. One eye open, Tomas…”

It isn’t much. Obviously, there’s no television or running water or amenities, so they’re just here to sleep. But it’s a rare moment of privacy, which Tomas enjoys. He spends half an hour trying to clear the dust from one of the two beds in the room, taking breaks to cough and choke and step out for fresh air. But eventually, he gives in and passes out atop the covers.

It’s no surprise when he wakes into another dream. This time, he’s right in the throes of pleasure. He knows he’s dreaming, but the feeling of Marcus’ mouth on his cock is so real that he wouldn’t be surprised if he’s moaning aloud right now. He’s got his hands in Marcus’ hair, his back arched. Marcus is all but swallowing him whole, with his hands on his partner’s thighs and his head bobbing rhythmically.

He’s close already…so close. His head falls back into the pillow and a moan rolls from his lips. It’s Marcus’ name—a mantra Tomas has grown all-too-attached to singing in his dreams.

And then Marcus pulls away. He curls his fingers around the base of his partner’s cock, then lifts his head to look up at him.

Tomas realizes that Marcus’ eyes are blue. It’s as painful as it is shocking to see, and Tomas feels his entire body go weak at the sight. How long has it been since he last looked into eyes that blue? Tomas’ heart aches more than it has in months, and he almost feels the compulsion to cry.

“Tell me what you want,” the demon says in Marcus’ voice. It can’t be Marcus, Tomas tells himself. It can’t be, because this isn’t real. Blue eyes don’t mean anything when scaled against the fact that Marcus cut and run to get his own demons sorted out. This is a trick. Just another dream Tomas’ twisted mind has conjured up to fill the hole that Marcus left behind.

“You,” the dream tells Tomas to respond, but it comes out shaky. “I want you, Marcus.”

And that’s exactly what Marcus gives him. Like so many times in so many dreams before this one, Tomas lets it happen. He follows the course of the dream, where he’s being fucked slow and deliberate and deep in the mattress, and the illusion that’s taken Marcus’ shape whispers insults and sweet nothings so intricately woven together that they sound like clauses in a song. And he loves it and he hates it and it makes him want to cry and scream and just take a moment to lose his damned mind about everything.

And he misses Marcus so much that when it’s all over and he’s lying on the bed with the dream of his lover kissing his neck and forehead and temple, he can almost convince himself that it’s real. The pale blue in those eyes makes it easier than usual.

It’s always the same. Any minute now, his chest is going to stop heaving from post-coital breathing and his eyes are going to snap open and the real world is going to swirl around him. It’s going to be in that cold, shut-down hotel room, with dust all over the place and no running water, and he’s going to want to make a mad dash for the truck and turn some heat on, and maybe talk Mouse into getting them to a truck stop so he can take a shower and brush his teeth and wash away the memory of letting some mental image fuck him right into submission.

But it’s not like that this time. When Tomas’ eyes snap open, it’s to a different image entirely.

He almost thinks he’s still dreaming, but then he realizes he’s in pain. His wrists feel like they’re being sliced clean open, and when he glances toward the left one, he learns that it’s because there are actual _hands_ clasped around them, with blunt nails carving right into the skin. Tomas actually sees blood pooling from his own skin right around each fingernail.

He knows who it is before he even looks. His heart thrums violently, so loudly that it’s pounding in his own skull, as he follows the hand up along the length of that leather-sleeved arm. He feels sick to his stomach when his eyes meet wide, inky black ones, and he finds himself staring right into the eyes of none other than a very-much-possessed Marcus Keane.

And as the very-much-possessed Marcus Keane dips down and closes its mouth around Tomas’ neck, he realizes that it all makes sense. That maybe the illusion in his head was never an illusion. That maybe he’s so tired because his energy is being consumed at night. That the dreams feel so real because on some level, they are. That even though Marcus has been gone for _so long_ , he’s been here this entire time.

And at the same time, he hasn’t. This isn’t Marcus, and it is.

As Tomas succumbs yet again, this time very much awake, he begins to cry.

**Author's Note:**

> So for those of you who are curious, the friend that prompted me for this one requested something having to do with Tomas or Marcus being an incubus. Clearly, this doesn't EXACTLY fit the guidelines for an incubus, but /shrug emoji/. Either way, hope you guys liked. Thanks for giving it a read! c:


End file.
